There are celebrity friendship origin stories, and then there is Michael Strahan and Pete Davidson’s. The two have been close for years, with Strahan even referring to the comedian as his “little brother.” However, the former Giants star didn't realize until 2018 that their connection began 17 years earlier, when the comedian was a grieving 7-year-old, and Strahan was still playing defensive end. The story is told in a new doc that recently hit the 2026 TV schedule.9/11: United We Stand — 25 Years Later is a new ABC documentary Strahan hosts and executive produces, now streaming for folks with a Hulu or Disney+ subscription. The special looks at the ways sports and entertainment helped people find moments of comfort after the Sept. 11 attacks. One of its most affecting stories involves Davidson, whose father, FDNY firefighter Scott Davidson, died while helping evacuate people from the World Trade Center complex. Strahan recalled:I was doing an interview with GMA. [Ariana Grande] kept saying, ‘I want you to meet my guy Pete Davidson.’ And I was a big fan of his on SNL at the time. So he comes in and he says, ‘Do you remember 9/11 and the first game back? You had a kid on your shoulder.’Then Davidson picks up the story. He added:I was like, ‘You remember that kid that you put on your shoulders?’ And he goes, ‘Yeah, yeah.’ I go, ‘You’re looking at him.’The documentary cuts back to Strahan, whose face says just about everything before he even gets the words out. He added:You talk about chills. In the doc, the filmmakers cut to behind-the-scenes footage where Grande quietly confirms to a shook Strahan, “No, that was Pete,” while Strahan, already getting emotional, tries to recover with a joke. He says:You can’t have me crying up in here, man… well, he’s not the same size he was back then.That reveal lands particularly hard when you remember why 7-year-old Davidson was on the field in the first place. After Davidson's father was killed responding to the Sept. 11 attacks, the Giants invited children who had lost parents onto the field. Said event was meant to give the kids a few hours in which football could offer a small distraction from everything their families were living through. Ultimately, the future SNL cast member and comedian wound up on Strahan’s shoulders. Seventeen years later, he got to tell him who that kid was.(Image credit: ABC)Davidson, who recently became a dad himself, also explains in the new documentary why sports can matter so much during the worst stretches of somebody’s life. For him, that Giants team was not some distant group of athletes. Their wins gave him something to hold onto. He said:When you’re a fan of a team, and you’re going through something, and they deliver for you, it feels personal. You know, you’re a part of something. It was a really, it was a special moment. It’s even more special now ‘cause he’s a good friend of mine. Sports, movies, moments they're very meaningful. And, you know, we needed… we needed that. You need that in life.That last part feels like the heart of Strahan’s entire documentary. United We Stand certainly provides a keen perspective on the role sports, music, Broadway and comedy played as people tried to find some sense of normalcy after Sept. 11. And Davidson’s story puts a face on that idea. For one grieving 7-year-old, it was football. More specifically, it was a football player who picked him up and put him on his shoulders without any idea that the moment would still matter 25 years later.Grab a Disney+ or Hulu subscription now and stream United We Stand – 25 Years Later .